by: Ethan Huff

(NaturalNews) A recently-released Senate committee report has uncovered that GlaxoSmithKline (GSK), the maker of the diabetes drug Avandia, concealed information verifying that the drug has caused tens of thousands of heart attacks in patients who took it. The 334-page report also indicts the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for failing to properly regulate the drug and ignoring the truth about its dangers.

It was also revealed that FDA officials had conducted confidential studies on Avandia and made recommendations that the drug be pulled from the market because it is unsafe. In 2007, however, an FDA advisory committee of scientists and doctors voted overwhelmingly to keep the drug on the market, while at the same time acknowledging that it increased the risk of a heart attack.

In the bizarre world of the drug industry, lies and deception are generally allowed to trump the facts. GSK responded to the allegations by claiming that extensive studies on more than 52,000 patients have shown no "statistically significant association between Avandia and heart attacks."

The whole ordeal began back in 2007 when Steve Nissen, a cardiologist from the Cleveland Clinic, published a study in the New England Journal of Medicine that showed a 43 percent increased risk of cardiovascular events in patients taking Avandia. Naturally, GSK denounced the study, but internal emails obtained and included in the Senate Finance Committee report revealed that GSK scientists agreed with Nissen's study as their own numbers were similar.

According to independent sources, GSK has known about the dangers of Avandia for years but has done everything possible to cover up the truth. In typical drug company fashion, GSK intimidated independent scientists that were critical of the drug, subverted independent reviews and studies of the drug's safety, and employed devious strategies to minimize all information about Avandia's dangers.

At the same time GSK was claiming that Avandia was perfectly safe, the company agreed to add a "black box" warning to the drug back in 2007 that said the drug can cause aggravate congestive heart failure. Black box warnings are the strongest type and are used on drugs that medical studies indicate carry significant risk or serious and even life-threatening negative side effects.

So which is it? Is Avandia safe or does it cause heart failure? According to GSK, both statements are somehow true. According to all independent analysis, Avandia is wholly unsafe and should be pulled from the market.

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Much of the significant profit made by pharmaceutical companies is made through sales of various antidepressants, anti anxiety, and mood related drugs. That`s pretty amazing considering that the average patient must try at least 3 different antidepressants before they find one that actually works for them.

Most antidepressants on the market have side effects so unsavory that the symptom may be better than the treatment. That doesn`t exactly make a great case for treating depression with these hard core meds.

These are both very good reasons to research other alternative options to help kick depression instead of going the conventional medicine route. That leads us to discuss the amino acid that many aren`t even aware of. This compound can help lessen anxiety and depression naturally, with minimal side effects. Oh, and another great thing about this supplement is that it`s dirt cheap compared to prescription medications.

The amino acid is none other than 5htp. Perhaps more known in herbal and alternative medicine circles as a great sleep aid and anti anxiety aid, many are also finding solace from their depression in 5htp.

5htp is simply an amino acid compound which is a conduit, or precursor if you will, to help the body make tryptophan, which is that calming chemical that puts you to sleep after eating a turkey dinner. This in turn creates that all important mood enhancing chemical serotonin.

5htp also plays a role in helping the body produce melatonin, which is the body`s natural "sleep" hormone that is released at night. However, 5htp does much more than relax you. It has been found to be an excellent natural mood regulator, anxiety releaser, and even an appetite suppressant in many cases.

This makes sense considering binge eaters typically have low serotonin levels. It has even been reported to help those with fibromyalgia, another disorder associated with serotonin deficiency.

As you can see, 5htp can be quite a useful supplement for several reasons, not just for mood enhancement.

So, if you want to try this easily accessible natural compound for mood enhancement, how should you start? Well, it`s important to read labeling if you should suffer from other ailments such as heart disease, or if you are already on antidepressants, as it may have contraindications you need to be aware of.

Also be mindful that when starting 5htp, you should start with a low dosage, and work your way up if you find it is not working for you. Most people that take it with success say that they take their first dose in the morning, a second dose in the middle of the day, and a third at the end of the day. This way, there is a consistent release of the mood stabilizing effects throughout the day.

Potential side effects of 5htp supplementation is diarrhea, dizziness, initial sleepiness, and nausea. Allergic reactions are always a consideration with any herbal, natural, or medical remedy, so be mindful to listen to your body when first starting out.

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This "permission to fly while medicated" decision by the FAA covers pilots taking the antidepressant psychiatric drugs Prozac, Zoloft, Celexa and Lexapro. Not coincidentally, these are the same drugs that, in the minds of many industry observers, are linked to acts of aggression, suicide and mass murder. People on these drugs may simply lose touch with reality and feel like they're playing out a video game rather than acting out in the real world.

It begs the question: Why is the FAA putting medicated pilots in control of jet airliners? What happens if a psych drug medicated pilot suddenly thinks he's in a video game and aims his Boeing 767 at a civilian target "just for the fun of it?" Or what if he goes raving mad, strangles the copilot and then crashes the jet airliner nose-first into the ground?

While this kind of scenario may seem remote, you have to remember: It only takes one such event to cost the lives of hundreds of air passengers (and perhaps thousands of people on the ground).

Today, air travel is remarkably safe in terms of the number of fatalities per miles traveled. It's far safer than traveling in your car, in fact, and a fair amount of the credit for that safety belongs with the FAA. So why is the FAA now making a decision that seems, on its surface, to endanger the lives of air passengers by allowing psychiatric patients to pilot airplanes?

According to the FAA, the answer is because modern psychiatric drugs have fewer side effects. That seems like a political statement, not a medical conclusion, because the side effects that are experienced by a very small number of psychiatric medication users can be so whacked out that they can pose a very real danger to the lives of those around them. The majority of U.S. school shootings that we've seen over the last 15 years have been carried out by shooters taking psychiatric medications.

The other part of this story that the FAA seems to be missing is that for all but the most extreme cases of depression, antidepressant drugs have been scientifically proven — through multiple clinical trials — to work no better than placebo. These pilots would do just as well taking capsules filled with olive oil as they do on patented, monopoly-priced SSRI drugs. Yet despite the scientific reality that antidepressants are no better than placebo for the vast majority of patients, doctors continue to prescribe them and now the FAA has allowed these drugs into the cockpit. Er, excuse me, the "Flight Deck."

And this makes me wonder whether those pilot-narrated fly-over descriptions — "On the left you can see Mt. St. Helens" — will start to include hallucinogenic elements, too. "On the right, I see Santa Claus and his ten reindeer, about to pass under engine number four. Please fasten your seat belts while we take evasive action…"

If a pilot suffers from depression, that's an indication that there's some other health problem they're dealing with: Usually cardiovascular disease of some kind.

Depression can also be brought on by vitamin D deficiencies or a diet lacking in omega-3 oils. Depression isn't simply an isolated "chemical imbalance in the brain," as the drug companies would like you to believe: It's a symptom of a much larger health challenge that almost always includes a cardiovascular component. So if a pilot suffers from depression, shouldn't that mean they need to reform their own personal health from the inside out rather than relying on a chemical agent to mask their symptoms?

I actually know a senior pilot for a major U.S. airline; a guy who flies the largest and most technical Boeing aircraft around. He's a member of the Life Extension Foundation and takes care of his health through exercise, fasting and daily nutritional supplementation. He's the kind of pilot I want behind the yoke because I believe that pilots have a special responsibility to be healthy and alert. I would not want to be a passenger on any airplane being piloted by a psychiatric patient medicated on Big Pharma's dangerous mind-altering drugs.

The difficulty, of course, is that you just don't know which pilot you're going to get on any given flight, nor what medications that person may be on. We've all seen the dangers of people who drive on the roads while medicated — they are responsible for as many as one-third of all traffic accidents today! There's no question in my mind that allowing medicated pilots to fly commercial airliners is increasing the risk of an accident that could harm or kill the crew and passengers.

So I'm going to lay out a prediction here, and even though it may take years for this to come true, there's little doubt it's coming unless the FAA reverses its rules: There will be an airplane crash one of these days where the cause is not merely "pilot error" but actually medication-induced pilot error. Some pilot who is psyched out on antidepressant drugs might fly his plane into a building, mountain, ocean or other landscape feature, and the NTSB will recover the black boxes only to find that the pilot had gone stark raving mad minutes before impact. A little more investigation will reveal he was on psychiatric prescription medications.

It seems an obvious point: Mind-altering psychotropic drugs should have no place on the flight deck. Most people who do not have ties to the pharmaceutical industry would agree with that.

At the same time, it's not just pilots who have responsibility for the lives of the people, is it? Members of the U.S. Congress are also making decisions that impact the lives (and livelihoods) of a far greater number of people than airline pilots. So why are most members of Congress doped up, psyched out and mass-medicated with dangerous pharmaceuticals, too?

In a recent video that has become an overnight YouTube sensation, U.S. Congressman Hank Johnson from the 4th district of Georgia actually claimed that putting too many people on the island of Guam would cause the island to tip over and capsize: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zNZc…

Yes, you read that right: This former court judge who somehow got elected to Congress by Georgian voters, said flatly and without joking: "My fear is that the whole island will become so overly populated that it will tip over and capsize." To which the steadfast Admiral Willard paused in disbelief and then replied, without even a hint of sarcasm, "We don't anticipate that."

Congressman Hank Johnson is not a stupid person. His bizarre on-camera behavior can best be explained by medication side effects. Watch the video and you can see for yourself how he's barely able to stumble through an attempted description of the geography of the island of Guam. He is displaying classic symptoms of an overly-medicated Congressman!

Now you know how the recent health care reform bill got passed. Many of those who voted for it were so over-medicated with Big Pharma's mind-altering drugs that they had no concept of what they were voting for. This is especially ironic, given that they were voting for enforcing a monopoly medical system that would ensure even more mind-altering drugs being prescribed for the American people!

This is why I have publicly called for health standards for all members of Congress. Medicated members of Congress should not be allowed to vote! And that would throw out virtually all the bastards, wouldn't it?

I was thinking we could take all those Congresspeople who no longer meet the health standards and ship them off to Guam to see if it actually does tip over.

In fact, why not make a new reality TV show featuring former U.S. Congressmen running wild on the beaches of Guam — and call it "The Tipping Point?"

by: David Gutierrez

(NaturalNews) Three days after approving the Eli Lilly and Amylin Pharmaceuticals drug Byetta as a stand-alone treatment for Type 2 diabetes, the FDA announced that the drug has been linked to kidney damage.

Byetta (known generically as exenatide) was first approved in 2005 for use in conjunction with other diabetes drugs only if a patient's blood sugar was failing to respond well to primary treatment. In 2007, the drug was linked to an increased risk of acute pancreatitis, a severe and potentially fatal inflammation of the pancreas. Symptoms of the condition include severe abdominal pain, sometimes with nausea and vomiting.

Even when the pancreas is unharmed, Byetta may still cause nausea, diarrhea and vomiting. The latter two conditions may place stress on the kidneys.

"It is thought that the main reason nausea occurs is the effects of Byetta on the stomach," said Richard Hellman of the University of Missouri-Kansas City School of Medicine. "If someone starts vomiting, they can lower the volume of fluid in their body. If it gets to dangerously low levels, their kidneys could be damaged and kidney failure could take place."

Although diabetes itself is a major cause of kidney failure, FDA reports show that among the 80 percent of patients who stopped taking Byetta after kidney symptoms emerged, 50 percent recovered.

The FDA now recommends that Byetta patients be carefully monitored for signs of kidney dysfunction, and that the drug be used cautiously in those with mild or moderate kidney impairment. The drug should not be used in patients with severe kidney failure.

"Before any patient takes Byetta, they should ask their physician whether they have decreased function of their kidneys and whether their kidneys are functioning well enough that taking Byetta would not be hazardous to their health," Hellman said.

by: E. Huff

(NaturalNews) A recent study published in the journal Science has concluded that the emergence of antibiotic-resistant superbugs, also known as methicillin resistant staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), was caused by the widespread use of synthetic antibiotic drugs which began in the 1960s.

Scientists analyzed 63 samples of MRSA that originated from a bacterium lineage called ST239 that is responsible for a large percentage of MRSA outbreaks in hospitals all over the world. The samples, which researchers collected over a 20-year period between 1982 and 2003, mostly came from North and South America, Europe, Australia, and Asia.

The team identified a pattern of mutations throughout the course of the strain's evolution that illustrated its tendency to develop resistance to antibiotics. Utilizing a technique developed by scientists at the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in Hinxton, Cambridgeshire that traces bacterial genetic codes, scientists were able to pinpoint the origins of the strain back to 1960s Europe, a time when widespread antibiotic use was just beginning to take hold in mainstream medicine.

Another aspect to the research was identifying how deadly bacterial strains are passed from person to person, hospital to hospital, and ultimately continent to continent. In order to accomplish this, scientists used a new technique that compares whole genomes with one another rather than isolated subsections of DNA code.

Experts believe such an approach will greatly help in preventing the spread of MRSA and other deadly bacteria by providing detailed information about how strains are transmitted. The technique also more accurately differentiates between closely related strains, improving the reliability of global MRSA surveillance programs.

The rapid rise of deadly hospital superbugs like MRSA continues to place the overuse of antibiotics in the spotlight as the culprit. Numerous studies and reports have concluded that synthetic antibiotic use has encouraged the growth of bacterial mutations that threaten public health.

One area where antibiotic-resistant superbugs have been emerging is on factory farms where heavy amounts of antibiotics are used to treat sick animals. Dirty feedlots, confined hatcheries, and other industrial techniques of raising animals for food are known to harbor and spread deadly diseases. Animals in these conditions are regularly given antibiotics, leading to the growth of antibiotic-resistant strains that continually require stronger treatments.

Many scientists still believe that the answer to deadly superbugs is to develop ever-stronger drugs to try to combat them. Based on the evidence, it is these very drugs that are the cause of the superbugs in the first place. Perhaps it is time to take a different approach.

by: E. Huff

(NaturalNews) Researchers from the University of Pennsylvania have found that antidepressant drugs do little to nothing for people with mild to moderate depression. Countering the belief that medication helps everyone with depression, Robert DeRubeis and his colleagues found that only in very severe cases of depression do antidepressants offer any sort of perceived benefit.

Published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, the study clarifies the benefit of antidepressants on those with varying degrees of depression. They administered Hamilton Depression Rating Scale questionnaires to 718 people who fell all across the depression spectrum. Study facilitators gave participants either an antidepressant or a placebo for at least six weeks. Following a second evaluation, the only participants who demonstrated measurable improvements were those falling into the "very severe" category of depression.

Researchers noted that those on medication with milder cases of depression are probably finding relief from the act of speaking with their doctors about their symptoms and learning more about their conditions. Interestingly, many people with mild depression find relief in simply speaking with another person about their feelings.

Antidepressant apologists were quick to defend the drugs, citing the possibility of an elevated placebo effect due to participation in the study. Dr. Philip Wang, deputy director of the National Institute of Mental Health, is one of them, emphasizing that if current antidepressants are not working for people on the milder end of the spectrum then drug companies must device custom antidepressants that will work for milder conditions.

The most common form of antidepressants used today are selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRIs. Recent studies have shown that SSRIs are highly dangerous. A National Institutes of Health (NIH) study published in the December 14 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine found that SSRIs increase the risk of stroke. The drugs are also implicated in causing suicidal and murderous thoughts, serious brain injuries, and death.

Those looking for some natural alternatives to SSRIs may wish to investigate L-tryptophan, an essential amino acid found most notably in turkey. Tryptophan is the only known precursor to serotonin found in the diet. Since serotonin is converted into melatonin which regulates mood and sleep patterns, tryptophan is highly effective at countering depression. Tryptophan is once again available on the market after being banned by the FDA in 1989.

Other options for treating depression include supplementation with 5-hydroxy tryptophan (5-HTP), the substance that the body creates from tryptophan, or S-Adenosyl methionine (SAMe), a derivative of the amino acid methionine that can help with depression, chronic fatigue syndrome, and fibromyalgia.